PGP News. Poverty and Growth Program

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1 September 2003 The (PGP) of the World Bank Institute, formerly known as Attacking Poverty Program (APP), aims to enhance the capacity of poor countries around the globe to implement, monitor and evaluate effective Poverty Reduction Strategies. Update In FY04 (July 1, June 30, 2004), the Attacking Poverty Program (APP) changed its name to Poverty and Growth Program (PGP), reflecting a deepening and broadening of the Attacking Poverty Programs. It now includes: Poverty Analysis Initiative (PAI) PRSP Design and Implementation Initiative (PRSDI) Macroeconomics and Policy Assessment Skills Program (MPASP) All programs are mutually complementing, aiming at poverty reduction in both the PRSP and the non-prsp developing countries. In addition to a wide array of courses for FY04, the PGP will take the lead in developing some pilots on institutional building in response to requests from countries. We are still at an early stage of developing the pilot activities and therefore details will be provided later. PGP will also coordinate a number of special initiatives and provide modules in specialized areas such as: Trade Integration Poverty and Social Impact Analysis (PSIA) Macro-economic models, including PAMS Public Finance and Fiscal Accountability Decentralization Community Driven Development Rural Poverty and Development Gender Dimension of Poverty Governance and Poverty one

2 Activities delivered during FY03 Over the last year (FY03) the PGP and its partners delivered more than 36 learning activities and reached more than 2,000 participants, who took part in over 9,400 training days. Although our main focus remains Africa, we have been increasingly active in other regions, including East Asia and Pacific (EAP), Europe and Central Asia (ECA), Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Program brief FY04 The following activities have already been carried out during FY04: July 2-6: As part of the ongoing collaboration between WBI and a number of international organizations and academic institutions in the area of macroeconomics and economic modeling, Hippolyte Fofack participated in the International Conference on Policy Modeling organized by the Global Economic Modeling Network. He chaired a Special Invited Session on the Integrated Macroeconomic Model for Poverty Analysis (IMMPA); a World Bank-based modeling framework whose development was initiated just about two years ago in a joint effort between WBI, PREM and the Africa Region. July 4-6: The collaborated with the ECA Region, and organized a 3-country researcher workshop in Kyrgyz Republic. The workshop included about 25 independent researchers from Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan, who presented their commissioned papers on broad aspects of poverty. In addition, officials from the government and statistical agencies from each country also participated. This activity was organized in the context of scaling up the impact of the region s poverty work, increasing open access to household dataset, carrying out collaborative work, and building local analytical capacity in the poverty area. July 15: The Poverty Analysis Initiative organised a video conference presentation to three countries in Francophone Africa on Poverty and Social Impact Analysis. The presentation was delivered by Aline Coudouel (PREM) to GDLN sites in Benin, Mauritania and Senegal. There was a especially large turnout in Mauritania as it marked one of the first usages of the just opened GDLN center there. Aug 5-9: The World Bank Institute hosted a Sudan Budget and Financial Training Workshop for Conflict Areas. A cooperative effort of WBI (RCET and PGP), IMF, and the Joint Planning Mechanism of the Sudanese Peoples Liberation Movement and the Government of Sudan, workshop participants examined topics ranging from decentralized budget preparation and execution, to activities that will address a postconflict Sudan issues of poverty reduction and the PRSP process to the growing concern of the financial implications of the repatriation of internally displaced persons. two

3 On August 21-22, the Community Empowerment Network in Uzbekistan, jointly supported by WBI s and Community Empowerment & Social Inclusion Program (CESI), organized the 1st National Community-driven Development (CDD) Forum in Tashkent (Uzbekistan), involving representatives from central government, local authorities, international organizations, NGOs and CBOs. This activity was the first wide-scale event for Uzbekistan with the aim to provide more knowledge about CDD basic concepts in the country and complementing ECA region efforts to expand the CDD work program in the country. On August 27th, a GDLN session connected about 25 participants in Afghanistan, Ahmedabad (the Self-Employed Women s Association) and Washington to discuss a proposed 5-7 day capacity enhancement program for Afghan participants who would visit India in the first week of December. The session facilitated dialogue among the participants on what the Afghans expected from such a training. Areas for capacity enhancement included: (i) market research and development of products; (ii) lost-cost preservation, packaging, and transportation of food products; (iii) determining an efficient pricing policy; (iv) quality control; (v) use of ICT in financial management; and (vi) organization of individual and group training and skills building. SEWA required the Afghan participants fill up a questionnaire on the nature of their current activities in order to design a responsive and useful program.to respond to the broad range of needs, SEWA proposed to organise the training in collaboration with State Government Departments and the Institute of Management in Ahmedabad. In each topic area, one Afghan focal point would be linked to a SEWA representative, and interaction and learning would begin initiated through EM exchanges between them prior to the tour, and followed up after the tour as required. The Afghan focal points would disseminate the knowledge gained to a wider audience upon their return. Aug 26-28: The Poverty and Growth Group, jointly with the Institut Panafricain Pour le Développement, Afrique de L Ouest/ Sahel (IPD/AOS), and with the cooperation of the Canadian Agency for International Development (IDRC), delivered a workshop on Monitoring of Poverty Reduction Strategies for senior government officials from four francophone african countries. The workshop took place in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, and included senior PRSP team members from a variety of ministries and institutions from the four participating countries: Burkina Faso, Cote D Ivoire, Mali, and Niger. Using a case study of an existing PRSP monitoring system (Tanzania) as a base of comparision, participants worked in breakout groups by country and by topic to evaluate their own monitoring systems, and to propose not only plans for their own system improvements, but to identify medium term training needs for each country, and discuss common areas of capacity building across countries in the region.this workshop will be followed up with a proposal for medium term capacity building program in poverty monitoring and evaluation, to be developed in cooperation with IDRC. Sept 1-12: The, jointly with the Joint Africa Institute (JAI), which is now based in Tunis, Tunisia, delivered a two-week course on Macroeconomic Management for Financial Stability and Poverty Reduction. The course was targeted to technocrats from the Central Bank and the core Ministries of Finance and Planning from English speaking countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Topics covered included a number of macroeconomic policy issues critical for growth and poverty reduction, (e.g. exchange rate regimes and currency crises, financial structure and the transmission process of monetary policy, and the economic and financial integration in Africa within the context of NEPAD and the PRSP process). The course also addressed analytical aspects of Financial Programming, RMSM-X and RMSM-X+P, and the Micro-Macro Linkages in the design of Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategies. Sept 10-11: The of the World Bank Institute, the Social Development Department of the World Bank and Research on Poverty Alleviation, a Tanzanian research institute, sponsored a video-conference between senior level research and policy analysts from a cross section of Tanzania s civil society. The Public Affairs Center (PAC) in Bangalore, India, gave a presentation on Citizen Report Card and the Community Score Card, public service monitoring tools that the PAC developed. Given the direct interface between Tanzanian NGOs and Bangalore s PAC, an avenue for South-South learning and exchange will be established that can be developed further in the future. three

4 Sept 10-16: The delivered another two courses of the Joint Donor Staff Training program in Hanoi, Vietnam. Officials from ten bilateral agencies working in the region attended the workshop. This courses are part of a 3-year program developed in close partnership with several donor agencies and run jointly with GTZ and the Institute for Health Sector Development (IHSD). Previous activities of this project, whose overall objective is to strengthen international partnership for an accelerated poverty reduction within the framework of government led PRSPs, have included courses in Mozambique and Tanzania. The Vietnam courses focused on strengthening participants technical knowledge on a relatively broad range of poverty reduction issues including political economy, budgeting, monitoring, evaluation and aid instruments. They also included strong emphasis on the implications of the Poverty Reduction Strategy approach for donor roles and behaviour, and strongly encouraged exchange of experience and ideas. Rosa Alonso was responsible for delivery of module 1 on the Political Economy of PRSPs while Marcos Van Den Boogaard was in charge of module 4 on Donor Coordination and Alignment. September: The PGP launched a new community of practice that has quickly become an important capacity building tool to complement our donor training program. The web-based PRSPs Joint Donor e-community is moderated by experts and includes both technical interaction and exchange of experiences for our alumni so they continue to be linked to the program while learning from each other through online communication. Forthcoming events PGP has planned a program with 53 activities to be delivered during FY04. Geographically, they are divided as follows: Participants in PGP activities Region of Origin FY04 Africa M ena ECA East Asia LAC Global Some of the courses that we will deliver during the rest of this fiscal year (FY04) are: Poverty Analisis Initiative (PAI) Senior Policy Seminar in East Asia, December 2003: This seminar will help senior policymakers and other stakeholders understand the importance of evidence-based policymaking for poverty reduction and its requirements for reliable information generation, processing, use in policymaking, and dissemination. Since it is envisaged that these functions will take place within the East Asia Poverty Analysis and Data Initiative (PADI) already launched by PAI in the region, the proposed senior policymakers seminar will review and endorse a proposed PADI work program which builds on a number of previous technical workshops for policy analysts, researchers, and academicians as well as managers of poverty monitoring and evaluation systems. Thus the SPS takes place with a technical foundation already present, allowing participants to focus on selection of broad research themes and identification of specific outputs that should happen under the PADI umbrella. Moreover, the SPS will forge a collaboration among the government agencies and the development agencies such as the Asian Development Bank (ADB), UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and the World Bank active in the region. Francophone Africa. PAI will be working closely with the Canadian International Development Agency to develop a program of regional and in-country support for poverty monitoring in Francophone Africa. This will include a regional course in basic poverty measurement and diagnostics, and specialized capacity enhancement for the PRSP monitoring and evaluation framework in Burkina Faso. The precise nature of the support is part of the followup discussions to the August activity, and will also be coordinated with our PRSDI colleagues. Basic Poverty Measurement and Diagnostics: Tajikistan, November Strengthening national capacity in poverty measurement, diagnostics, and analysis. Includes software such as SPSS. four

5 Laos; Basic poverty measurement and data; M&E training. December 2003 Regional Advanced Impact Evaluation (Egypt, Yemen), March 2004: Standard Impact Evaluation techniques with emphasis on Social Fund projects. PADI followup (Anglophone Africa), May 2004: Senior Policy Seminar which will review the thematic research agenda that has emerged from previous technical discussions; the seminar will also be a forum for presentations to high level policymakers on issues of current relevance such as pro-poor growth and poverty and social impact analysis Mexico; Capacity building in impact evaluation of antipoverty programs; 5 day hands-on-training on analyzing data using STATA. For more information on PAI courses, please contact Shahid Khandker (skhandker@worldbank.org) PSRP Design and Implementation Initiative (PRSDI) APC Burkina Faso, October Key Issues in PRSP Design: Support in developing a revised PRSP: Building logframe of goals, indicators, targets and policy actions for PRS and strengthening the gender content of the new PRSP. Second Forum for East Asian PRSP Countries. Cambodia, October The forum will focus on Implementation Issues. APC Tanzania: October Public Expenditure Execution and Service Delivery Monitoring by CSOs Training of trainers of NGOs to track PRS implementation at the local level. CIS-7 Mainstreaming Gender in the PRSP process Nov Workshop w/ ECA Gender group. The idea is to bring together representatives from the seven CIS countries implementing PRSPs to share information and ideas, and to develop country specific plans of action for integrating gender issues into the PRSP process. Attacking Poverty Courses Vietnam: December 2003 and February Key Issues in PRSP Implementation. Sudan; Attacking Poverty Course focused on discussion on the dimensions of poverty and priorities in both north and south; focus on sectoral strategies and linking it to MTEF, fiscal decentralization and capacity enhancement in PRSP design and implementation, including monitoring systems. Joint Donor/Staff Trainings: Burkina Faso, LAC, ECA These trainings aim to strengthen the ability and capability of the staff of the participating bilateral donors to participate as partners within the new PRSP policy frameworks for the promotion of poverty reduction policies. The emphasis of the courses will be on donor roles and behaviour, through the exchange of experiences and ideas. WBI will deliver a module on the political economy of PRSPs and a module on innovative donor practices. APC Tanzania: Feb Capacity Enhancement in Budget Analysis for Civil Society Organization. Strengthen the M&E capacity of civil society to participate in the yearly participatory public expenditure review, hence fostering greater links between the PRS and the budget. APC Tanzania: April Capacity Enhancement in Economic Literacy for Civil Society Organizations Designed to allow CSOs to make the most of their participation in the macro-economic and the main PER working groups in the country s participatory public expenditure review. Regional workshop for 6-Central Asian country NGO and Civil Society on Community Driven Development April Second Balkan Forum - Albania, Bosnia Herzegovina, and FR Yugoslavia - Budapest, April, May Focus on Implementation Issues. The main topics for discussions, as identified previously by the participating countries, are: growth with equity, private sector role in poverty reduction, governance, fiscal framework, poverty indicators and monitoring, debt management and external financing/borrowing, refugees and Internally Displaced Persons, post conflict management. For more information of PRSDI courses, please contact Rosa Alonso (ralonsoiterme@worldbank.org) five

6 Macroeconomics and Policy Assessment Skills Program (MPASP) AFRICA Francophone PRSP implementation Issues focused on Costing, Prioritization, M&E: Rwanda or Burundi, October PRSP teams will learn about setting intermediate targets, monitoring and evaluation, prioritization, PRSP costing, and public expenditure management. Macroeconomic Management Issues in Oil Exporting Countries: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: October-December Issues and Challenges for Gulf States. Macroeconomic Management in Oil-Exporting Countries: Issues and Challenges for Algeria. Algiers, Algeria: December 1-6, Workshop - Micro-Macro Linkages for the Design of Poverty Reduction Strategies. Washington, DC: November 10-13, AFRICA Anglophone PRSP Costing, Prioritization, M&E: Mozambique, Dec PRSP teams will learn about setting intermediate targets, monitoring and evaluation, prioritization, PRSP costing. Internet - Macroeconomic Management and Poverty Reduction: Issues and Case Studies. Internet: February- March Macroeconomic Management and Poverty Reduction: Issues and Policy Lessons for sub-saharan Africa. DL- Benin, Senegal, Mauritania, Burkina Faso: February-March SPS - Capital Flows, Monetary Policy, and the International Monetary System. Paris, France: March 8-11, 2004 For more information on MPASP courses, please contact Hippolyte Fofack (hfofack@worldbank.org) For further information on our program and activities, please check our web page: Please send any remarks to attackingpoverty@worldbank.org or to Mr. Raj Nallari, Manager of the programme at rnallari@worldbank.org or by fax: We look forward to your comments! six